2025 Highlights & the Start of New Chapters at Patient Innovation

As the year comes to an end, the Patient Innovation team is pleased to share its Christmas Newsletter, reflecting on our achievements in 2025 and offering a glimpse of what’s ahead in 2026. Above all, remains our commitment to strengthening the patient innovation voice together with you !

Our Patient Innovation Platform: discover what's new from 2025

The Patient Innovation platform serves to clinically validate patient-driven innovations by connecting patient innovators with medical professionals, while also acting as a channel to share these innovations with the wider community. Let’s dive into this year’s statistics!

Top 5 medical fields distribution :

Most viewed story :

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Most liked story :

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Our Entrepreneurial Programs

(a) Closing six consecutive editions of the Patient Innovation Bootcamp

This year marked the 6th and last edition of the Patient Innovation Bootcamp, funded by EIT Health and supported by an outstanding European consortium led by Copenhagen Business School, including Nova School of Business and Economics, Nova Medical School, Patient Innovation Association, Biocat, and IESE Business School.

As we close a cycle of six consecutive editions (2020–2025), we extend a huge thank you to all the organizers, mentors, experts, and, most importantly, to the patient and caregiver entrepreneurs who made this journey possible !

Check out all past editions and their projects!

2020

2023

2021

2024

2022

2025

We have gathered 64 start-ups from over 25 European countries ...

... and a total of :

(b) Running a CMU Portugal Patient Innovation Accelerator Pilot

A six-month pilot ran from January to June 2025, supporting patient-led projects from early-stage solutions to implementation. The program combined weekly mentorship, training, and an intensive in-person residency at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, where teams attended expert sessions on regulation, strategy, and market access, met investors and healthcare leaders, and visited institutions such as UPMC Enterprises and Allegheny Health Network. The journey ended in Lisbon with workshops to refine go-to-market plans and explore opportunities in the U.S. and beyond.

(c) Building on the HealthEConnect European Project

HealthEConnect was an EU‑funded initiative that ran from Jan 2023 to Jul 2025, bringing together Patient Innovation with Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Copenhagen Business School, Startup Europe Regions Network, and BioInnovation Institute.

The main objective of this project was to support the rise and growth of the next-generation Health Tech Companies in Lisbon Region through Copenhagen Expertise through a user‑centered entrepreneurial education program at Nova School School of Business & Economics and Nova Medical School.

2025-2026 Edition :

Although the project has come to an end, the program continues: we are launching a new edition of our Health Innovation Specialization and are now inviting organizations to submit Work Project proposals for Fall 2026.

Apply here!

Our Outreach Activities

(a) Patient Innovation Research Presented at the Open and User Innovation Conference 2025

At the Open and User Innovation Conference, Patient Innovation was featured in the Open Social Innovation & Sustainability session.

Gemma Tria presented her first academic paper, "Multi-Sided Platforms as Catalysts for Responsible Innovation in Healthcare: Patient Innovation as a case-study" co-authored with Maria João Jacinto, Margarida Oliveira, Helena Canhão, and Pedro Oliveira, on how Patient Innovation fosters responsible, patient-led innovation and supports more inclusive health systems as a multi-sided platform.

(b) Patient Innovation Bootcamp won the European Enterprise Promotion Awards

In 2025, the Patient Innovation Bootcamp was recognized as the 2nd National Winner at the European Enterprise Promotion Awards, in the category “Promotion of Responsible and Inclusive Entrepreneurship”.

This award reinforces our commitment in supporting patient and caregiver innovators, throughout their journey of innovators, making sure they hold a voice in the health innovation paradigm.

(c) Patient Innovation launched a Book

At the Open and User Innovation Conference at Nova SBE, we proudly launched Patient Innovation: Inspiring Stories about Impactful Innovations Developed by Patients, Caregivers, and Collaborators.

The book brings together stories from around the world, showing how personal challenges can lead to meaningful innovations, and includes contributions from Sir Richard Roberts, Eric von Hippel, and Hans Jørgen Wiberg. Thank you to everyone who shared their experiences and contributed to this project.

As we close the year, choosing this book (whether for yourself or as a thoughtful gift) is also a way to support the Patient Innovation Association and help these stories continue to inspire others.

The book is available in print and online at FNAC and Bertrand libraries (in Portugal and Brazil) and through the publisher.